


Finish

by missmissa85



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, F/M, Fix-It, Friendship, Spoilers, a little justice for rose, can't get more specific than that, read fic AFTER seeing TROS, that is just general advice
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-12-22
Updated: 2019-12-28
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:13:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,457
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21896467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missmissa85/pseuds/missmissa85
Summary: Spoilers for TROS in this summary!!Anakin Skywalker gives up his remaining life force to save his wayward grandson, but Ben remains seriously injured and he and Rey must navigate the hurt and hope his continued life brings.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 3
Kudos: 52





	1. Rey/Ben/Finn

**Author's Note:**

> I'll be real with you guys, I didn't actually mind the end of Rise. Would I have preferred for Ben and Rey to ride off into a twin sunset together? I'm writing a fix-it fic, so I think the answer to that is fairly obvious. But, overall, I liked that Ben's end mirrored Anakin's (turning from the dark and laying his life down for someone he loved) and that he was able to do what Anakin couldn't: bring the woman he loved back from death. It kind of gives the whole trilogy-trilogy a nice circularity. But, dude. Can we please give the Skywalkers a break? I guess that's our job now.

She thought his smile was one of the most beautiful things she had ever seen. There was something of his father in it, and she had the feeling the man before her now wouldn’t mind the comparison. She wanted to say something in this joyous moment, but the smile faded, and her own fell from her face, horror taking its place as he began to collapse. The bright spark of him she felt through the Force was fading. She held onto his face as she watched his eyes close and called his name.

He had given what life force Palpatine had not stolen and broken to bring her back. She didn’t want to throw away his gift, but neither did she want to see him pass from her life. She had only just gotten him.Fate had stolen so much from her already, it needn’t take what she had only just received. So, she cried out to all those who came before, the voices she had heard so clearly only moments earlier. But silence was all that replied. Her fists balled in his shirt and she pressed her head to his chest to hear his heartbeat fading as the battle raged overhead.

Something shifted in the air and she raised her head to see a man bathed in blue light.He was older than Ben, but not by much.His hair was long and wild, and he had a scar across his right eye. He wore the robes of the Jedi. He smiled kindly at her before he knelt down next to Ben.

“Who are you?” she asked, her voice coming out in a choked sob.

“I’m Anakin Skywalker,” he replied, looking her in the eye. “It’s all right, Rey.He’s my daughter’s son, named for the best man I ever knew, the brother I betrayed.I’m here for him.”

Rey sat back on her haunches, one hand still resting on Ben’s fading heart. The ghost of the grandfather Kylo Ren grossly revered leaned over Ben and pressed both of his hands to his face.

“You can’t let go yet,” Anakin said, his voice soft but firm. “You have to fix your mistakes. You have to finish what I started.You have to wake up.”

Anakin leaned down and pressed his lips to Ben’s forehead. Rey watched as the elder Skywalker faded away.She wanted to yell at him to come back, but then she felt the heartbeat beneath her hand increase in strength and speed. Ben’s chest rose and fell with even breaths. His eyes fluttered open and looked around in confusion until they landed on her. Horror replaced his confusion, and his hand reached up to her face.

“Rey, what did you do?” he asked, his voice strangled from lack of air.

She could feel a pain in her heart.He had been willing to give his life for hers, and he didn’t believe he was worth the same sacrifice. Rey had always believed in Ben Solo, and she would spend her life helping him believe as well. She gripped his arm and turned her face to his the palm of his bloodied hand.

“It wasn’t me,” she told him quietly, threading the fingers of her other hand through his hair. “It was your grandfather. It was Anakin Skywalker. It was your grandfather. He said you couldn’t go yet. That you had to finish what he started.”

Ben’s shallow breaths caught in his throat. “I don’t think I can,” he said, his voice small and weak.

Rey leaned down until her forehead was pressed to his.“Maybe you can’t,” she whispered, “but _we_ can.”

She didn’t know how long they held each other in the darkness that threatened to consume them. Eventually, the shaking of the ground and the sound of crashing starships drew her attention back to the present.She summoned Luke and Leia’s lightsabers and clipped them to her belt.She drew Ben’s arm around her shoulders and hauled him upward. It was no mean feat considering he was a head taller and weighed at least twice as much. One of his legs was broken to uselessness, and she could actually hear his ribs scraping together as he breathed. He was barely conscious and kept muttering that she should leave without him. She ignored him as they stumbled together across broken stones and bodies until they reached Red Five. She used the Force to lift his nearly lifeless rock of a body into the gunner’s seat. Her own strength nearly failed her as she climbed the ladder into the pilot’s seat.Three deep breaths later, she ignited the engines and guided the x-wing into the stormy sky.The sound of Poe’s voice in her helmet comforted her as she followed him back to the base.She was piloting on instinct as she did not have the energy to think in the moment. She focused on the weak, but steady thrum of Ben’s life reverberating in the background of her own even as she landed in the joyful chaos of the Resistance base.

* * *

He was barely aware of anything other than pain. Snoke had taught him that power comes from pain, but he knew that to be a lie now. Love had brought Rey back. Love had brought him back. Pain was not the way.Pain left him powerless, though he could not find it in himself to care. 

He wasn’t entirely sure where he was.His knees were drawn to his chest because there was not enough room for his long legs. He wondered idly if he was in a coffin before he heard a sound like an engine powering down and the rocking of a craft landing. Then he remembered Rey dragging him onto his uncle’s x-wing.He remembered not dying, although he wasn’t sure of the order of the events.

He felt her presence in the Force, warm and light.He wanted to reach a hand out to her, but she was moving away from him and he didn’t have the strength to make his body do anything. Then he heard a roar. Chewie was yelling at him. His uncle never yelled at him, never even raised his voice. But he was yelling now, and Ben could only make out one word: “Why?”

He forced his eyes open and took in the snarling face of his favorite uncle. He knew he didn’t have the strength to explain, but he wanted to say something. As he opened his mouth, though, he felt something snap and a sharp pain stabbed through his lungs. There was something bitter and metallic in his mouth and it came out instead of words. The snarl was gone from his uncle’s face, but there was blood on his fur. Had he accidentally hurt Chewie? He wanted to reach out, to apologize, to do anything, but he couldn’t do anything other than feel the pain in his chest.

He thought he heard Rey scream his name as strong, warm arms wrapped around him and pulled him from his confinement.His body screeched in agony as he wretched again and again, gasping for air that never seemed to fill him. He was dying again, much more painfully than last time. He felt many hands on his body as he landed on something soft. He heard his uncle call him ‘cub’ like he had in the old days and felt him stroke his hair. Then he felt her, not just through the Force, but real and solid.

“Don’t let go,” she whispered.It was the last thing he heard before he knew nothing.

* * *

Finn’s eyes followed Red Five’s descent to the ground.He chased it and Poe met him somewhere along the way.The both skidded to a stop as Rey stumbled down the ladder. They each wrapped an arm around her as she held them both close. He put his other arm around Poe’s shoulders and held his friends as tightly as he could.They were home.He felt her die, he was sure of it, but she was real, and they were finally home.

Chewbacca’s pained roar broke them apart. Finn watched in confusion as the Wookie climbed the side of the old x-wing. 

Poe’s eyes darted from Chewie to Rey and demanded, “What the hell are you doing with him?!”

Finn looked up and found what had upset his friend. Kylo Ren was crammed into the gunner’s seat of the x-wing.But something was different.Finn had always felt uneasy around Ren in the past, but now he felt calm and something like sadness. He almost felt sorry for him as Chewie snarled in his face. Then the former Supreme Leader of the First Order opened his mouth as if to speak, and only blood spewed out.

“Ben!” Rey screamed, turning in the circle of their arms.

“M-medic!” Finn yelled automatically.“We need help over here!”

“What do you think you’re doing?” Poe yelled, roughly grabbing Finn’s arm.“We can’t help that monster!”

“He’s not a monster! He’s not! He’s the only reason I’m alive!” Rey told him, tears rolling down her cheeks and her voice close to hysteria.

Finn still had an arm around Rey’s waist as his attention was divide between his friends and what was happening on the x-wing. The anger was completely gone from Chewie and Finn was startled at the gentleness with which the Wookie lifted the younger man from the cockpit. Lt. Connix directed a group of medics to get him down onto a cot, her voice sure and strong as she did so. Poe angrily grabbed her arm and said, “Kay, do you even know who that is?”

She jerked her arm away and calmly replied, “Yeah, I do.He’s Leia’s son.”

Poe was left staring as Rey pulled herself from Finn’s loose grasp. He watched as she whispered something into Ren’s ear. Finn felt a pang of jealousy as her fingers lingered in the bloodied locks of his hair before the medics rushed him away. He pushed the feeling away, though, as Rey stumbled forward. He rushed forward and caught her about the waist to keep her upright.

“He can’t die,” she said, her voice like a whimper. “He saved me. He can’t die now.”

She slumped against him suddenly and he had to widen his stance to keep them both upright. Poe was now demanding an explanation from Chewie for his actions. His annoyance with his friend was replaced with anger and he yelled, “Poe! You put me in command of you, and I’m giving you an order to get your head out of your ass!Rey needs help.We can get an explanation after we get her to a medic.”

Anger was the first emotion on Poe’s face, but it quickly disappeared in favor of compassion and he went to Rey’s other side and wrapped his good arm around her. She was conscious, but unable to really support herself. She whispered her thanks to them as she held onto their shoulders and they ambled together toward the medical unit.


	2. Rey/Finn/Lando

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There are references/appearances by Star Wars: Rebels characters in this chapter. The Ghost is one of the more prominent ships in what I’m calling the Dunkirk scene and Lando knows them, so it made sense to me. There’s also discussion of Lando’s kidnapped daughter which has been explained to us in related content, but not so much in the movie. If it’s super unclear, just drop me a line in the comments.
> 
> Enjoy!

The doctor who examined Rey was horrified by the readings on her scans.Whatever Palpatine had done had attacked her on a cellular level.Her body was slowly healing itself although the doctor couldn’t say how. When Rey told her that the same thing had happened to Ben, she rushed off to inform the surgical droids that were with him. Rose, who had appeared at some point, handed Rey a steaming cup of tea. She sipped it gratefully.

Finn finally broke the silence saying, “Rey, why did the Emperor attack you and Kylo Ren in the same way?”

Rey looked up from her tea to the expectant faces around the room. “I…” she began before looking back down at her tea.

“It’s okay,” Rose said gently.“I’ll go.”

“I don’t mean—”

“No, it’s all right,” the other woman cut her off with a smile. “We don’t know each other that well. And they’re family.I understand.”

Rey saw Rose squeeze Finn’s shoulder reassuringly before she left the small room. Finn watched her go with a sad look before returning his attention to Rey. It was almost stifling the number of people in the room. Chewie stood in the corner his arms folded across his chest. Poe was sitting on the table idly flexing the fingers of his injured arm. Finn was sitting directly across from her spot on the cot on the stool the doctor had previously occupied. BB-8 was rolling about her feet.Nearly all of the beings she treasured most were in the room with her. 

So she took a deep breath and told them everything. She didn’t look up from the tea in her hands.She didn’t want to see the looks on their faces, whether it be judgment or pity. She told them about her parents, her grandfather. She told them about stabbing Kylo Ren as Leia reached out to them both and about saving him from death. She told them about returning to Ahch-To and what Luke had given to her and said. Lastly, she told them about the bond between her and Ben, that it had started after Starkiller, but she had blocked him out after Crait, until Pasaana.She didn’t give them a moment to comment on that probable shortcoming before she told them that the energy from their bond restored the Emperor when it was drained from them. He had been manipulating them to defeat death. She told them how the Emperor tossed Ben into a chasm in vengeance, how she used all of her strength to turn the Emperor’s power on himself until it ripped him to shreds, how Ben must have pulled himself out of a pit to bring her back because he was holding her when she awoke. She didn’t tell them about the kiss. That was only for her and Ben. She did, however, tell them about Anakin Skywalker coming back through the Force to revive his grandson. They may not understand or even believe her, but she felt it was important for them to know that it was not just her that wanted Ben Solo alive.

The small room had been uncomfortably silent when she finally looked up from her cup. Poe’s face was uncharacteristically blank. Chewie was brushing tears from his eyes. Finn’s brow was scrunched in concentration as he looked down at the floor.

“You’re bound to Kylo Ren. Does that mean you’re, like, married?”

“Really, Finn?” Poe scoffed.“That’s what you took from that?”

“Hey, I’m just trying to understand,” Finn said, glaring at the pilot over his shoulder.

“Kylo Ren is gone,” Rey explained, setting the cold cup of tea aside and reaching for his hands. “I’m bound to Ben Solo.”

Finn met her eyes. “Do you want to be?” he asked, his voice betraying the fact that he didn’t really want to know the answer.

Rey squeezed his hands and looked into his eyes. She nodded slowly and Finn’s shoulders slumped slightly before he nodded himself.

“Rey,” he said, taking a breath, “he’s going to have to answer for what he’s done.”

A low, threatening rumble started deep in Chewie’s chest.Rey started to protest herself, but, surprisingly, it was Poe who spoke, “Calm down, Chewie. We’re not going to toss him to an angry mob.”

“I wasn’t suggesting that,” Finn said, letting go of Rey’s hands entirely and standing to face the other man. “Ren should stand trial.”

“It’s Ben.Kylo Ren is gone,” Rey insisted.

“Stand trial for who, huh?” Poe asked, looking only at Finn. “There’s no galactic government.”

“We’ll form one.Isn’t that was this whole fight has been for?”

“Maybe,” Poe replied, sighing deeply, “but reforming the government could take years, and…I’m not even sure we can find Ben Solo guilty.”

There was a pregnant pause and Rey held her breath as her two friends glared at one another.

“Are you serious right now?” Finn finally exploded, throwing his hands up. “You’ve seen first hand the things he’s done!”

“Yeah, and I was listening to Rey, too. The whole galaxy heard Palpatine’s voice. He was manipulating everything, and the kid was more vulnerable than most.”

“That ‘kid’ still knew right from wrong!”

“Yeah, well, so did I!”

Finn cocked his head and Rey found her eyebrows knitting together in confusion. Poe huffed as he looked between them. “I ran spice,” he reminded them. “My mother helped put that Death Star in the waves on Kef Bir and I became a spice runner. That stuff destroys people’s lives, millions of Chewie’s people died in the mines under the Empire, and I helped keep the syndicates in business; crime syndicates that have been murdering and enslaving people since the days of the Galactic Republic. I’ve got blood on my hands too, and no one was manipulating me through the Force because my grandfather pissed him off one time.”

“I can’t believe I’m hearing this! You didn’t even want me to call for a medic!”

“I…I had a knee-jerk reaction,” Poe defended, waving his good arm wildly. “And I didn’t have Rey’s side of the story. I trust her. Don’t you?”

Finn’s fists balled at his sides and he marched out of the small room. Poe groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose. Rey let out her breath slowly.

“I didn’t expect that from you,” she told him quietly and Chewie echoed the sentiment.

Poe looked up at the Wookie and said, “Do you remember my mom’s funeral? I remember you. You were sort of hard to miss.”

Chewbacca replied with a slight annoyance that made Rey smile.

“Yeah, well, Ben Solo was there, too,” Poe continued, sitting down on the cot next to her. “He couldn’t have been more than four; big eyes, bigger ears.”

Laughter bubbled from deep in Chewie’s lungs and a smile tugged at her tired lips. Poe was grinning as he continued, “I was sitting by myself under this tree after the service, and that kid just came up to me and gave me a flower and ran off with this stupid grin on his face. I think it was the first time I smiled since my mother had died, and it was the last time I would smile for a long time after. No one is born evil.I think, right now, you know that better than anyone, Rey.”

She nodded, tears stinging her eyes at the weight of Poe’s words.She had chosen for herself a path toward the Light despite her family’s past. She was the sum of her experiences rather than simply her birth.

Poe took her silence as an invitation to continue as he said, “Now, I’m not saying we throw the guy a parade, or let him have a voice in how the galaxy is governed whenever the dust settles, but I think he at least deserves to know what it’s like to live a life without someone yanking his strings and with someone who loves him.”

Rey wrapped her arms around his neck. Poe was still for a moment before circling her waist with his good arm. Her shoulders slumped and the act of breathing became hard. She hadn’t realized how tense she was until the relief started coursing through her.

Chewie told her she needed to rest and Poe echoed his sentiments, or she thought he did. Listening was becoming difficult too.

“I can’t,” she managed. “I have to know if he’s alright.”

“We’ll wake you as soon as we know anything,” Poe assured her. “And I’m not gonna let anything be happen to him, none of us will.”

Rey nodded wordlessly and laid back toward the cot. She reached out with the Force and felt the weak but steady spark of Ben’s life. She focused on the thrum of it as her eyelids fluttered closed and sleep took her over.

* * *

Finn felt his blood boiling. Ajan Kloss was always humid, but he felt too hot for his clothes and he pulled at the collar of his shirt.No one noticed. Everyone was still celebrating. Someone had clearly broken out the stash of liquor Beaumont and Snap had been distilling behind the barracks. He gripped the rock face of a cave wall and heaved several deep breaths.

“Hey,” a gentle voice said with a hand on his back. “Finn, are you okay?”

He turned to Rose and squeezed her hand. “I’ll be fine,” he lied.

“I don’t really believe you,” she said with a sad smile. “Is it because of Ben Solo?”

Finn nodded and sank to the ground. He still had a hold of her hand, and she followed to sit down next to him. He breathed in and out slowly as he considered his words. Rose watched him patiently and stroked the back of his hand with her thumb.

“Do you think that everybody deserves forgiveness?” he asked finally.

“It depends,” she began. “I think if a person asks for forgiveness and shows their willingness to change through their actions, then I think they should be forgiven.”

“Even if the things they’ve done are horrible?”

“Even if they’re Kylo Ren.”

Finn gave her a sidelong glance and there was mischief in her eyes as she continued, “I know he’s done really, really awful things, but Rey brought him back here, so I have to believe that however she defeated the Emperor, Ben Solo helped her. That sounds like a willingness to change.”

“Maybe,” Finn shrugged. “I feel like he was going to ask for forgiveness when he started coughing blood all over Chewie. Of course, who wouldn’t apologize to an angry Wookie?”

Rose chuckled. “That’s true.” She took a breath and the smile slowly faded from her face. “Finn, the whole galaxy heard Palpatine’s voice. He basically broadcasted his own confession. Ben Solo comes from a family that’s strong with the Force. We know that the Force can be a wonderful gift, but it can be a curse as well. If you hadn’t escaped the First Order when you did, the Emperor might have tried to manipulate you, too.”

Finn’s brow furrowed in confusion. “Why would he have done that?”

“Because you have the Force, dummy.”

He looked up at her with wide eyes. She was simply giving him as serene a smile as always.

“H-h-how did you know?”

“For starters, your aim is much too good to just be a stormtrooper. You know when something’s about to go wrong. You always duck when Kay throws something at you.”

Finn allowed himself a small smile at that.

“And you’re very firm in your convictions. I think that’s how someone in touch with the lifeblood of the universe should be.”

“That’s funny coming from you,” he said, looking her in the eye. “You have the strongest convictions of anyone I know.”

“You’re the one that called a medic for a man you pretty much hate.”

“He was coughing up blood. What else was I gonna do?”

“See what I mean? Firm in your convictions.”

They sat in silence as the celebration continued apace. Finn closed his eyes tightly as something like shame crept up his spine. “I just don’t know if I can forgive him.”

Rose pursed her lips and looked away before replying. “I think,” she began slowly, “that what matters more is if you can accept that he is important to Rey.”

“I guess I’ll have to try.”

* * *

Lando took in the scene around him; a celebration at the end of a great, galaxy-altering battle. It was the second one he had been in, and he prayed to who or whatever was listening that he wouldn’t have to see a third. His eyes followed Jannah as an Ithorian attempted to dance with her.

“Isn’t she a little young for you?”

Lando smiled at the voice of Hera Syndulla. She had aged far more gracefully than he had. Her green skin was a few shades lighter and there were a few wrinkles around her eyes. Her arms were folded across her chest as they usually were, but a smile graced her lips.

“She happens to be about my daughter’s age, actually,” he assured her.

“Oh,” Hera said softly, sitting down next to him on the makeshift bench. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be,” Lando said, looking at his old...friend. “She was a stormtrooper. It’s just an interesting feeling having hope again.”

“I know the feeling.”

Lando followed her gaze to where a tall, lanky man with pointed ears and green hair was talking animatedly with Poe. “You actually let him fly this one?” he asked.

Hera scoffed. “Not a chance.”

A comfortable silence settled between them. Lando let his mind wander to all the children lost throughout the years. Hera’s first children, Ezra and Sabine, had lost their childhoods to the Empire and even the Rebellion. The First Order had stolen thousands if not millions of children. Even young Ben had lost most of any semblance of a childhood due to the responsibilities his parents had undertaken before they sent him away.

“Why did you never send Jacen to be trained as a Jedi?”

Hera’s eyes remained on her son as she said, “Maybe I was just being selfish after we lost Ezra, but don’t think it’s what Kanan would have wanted that either.”

“Really?”

She nodded. “He was a Jedi, truly, but surviving Order 66 meant that he could see the flaws in the Jedi Order’s way of life. What Skywalker was trying to do just seemed to me like repeating the mistakes of the past.”

“Can’t really disagree with you,” Lando mused. “I never understood why Han and Leia sent Ben away, not after I lost my baby girl. I just couldn’t understand consciously separating yourself from your child. Luke did his best, but even then, he was Ben’s teacher before he was his family. Now they’re gone, even the kid. Never even had a chance to make it right.”

“That’s not exactly...correct,” Hera told him slowly.

Lando looked up at her cautious expression. “What do you mean?”

“Jacen saw the Jedi, Rey, land with Kylo Ren, or Ben Solo, or whatever he calls himself. She brought him back from the surface Exegol. He was in bad shape; coughed blood up all over Chewbacca, apparently. Last I heard, the medical droids weren’t optimistic, but they never are.”

Lando’s eyes found Jannah, whom Poe was introducing to Jacen. A lightness started burning within him. His friends believed in hope, and as long as their son still drew breath, there was hope he could be better. A smile broke across Lando’s face. “Hera, that is the second-best thing I’ve heard today.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Pretty sure I gave Rose more of a purpose in two scenes than JJ did in the entire movie.
> 
> Thanks for reading!


End file.
